Editorial: Don't be duped on tickets

Pity the poor fools who went online and thought they were buying great tickets to the upcoming “Million Dollar Quartet” Broadway show at the Orpheum in Memphis — when in fact they were being duped.

It may well have happened. Unscrupulous ticket scalpers have figured out a way to make money from a gullible public looking for a good deal.

New computer technology allows scalpers to scoop up hundreds of tickets when they first go on sale, tying up many of the best seats to shows before the ticket-buying public even knows what hit them. Then, the electronic scalpers post the tickets for sale on their own websites, which look official but aren’t — and often offer the tickets at much higher prices.

It’s become a giant problem for entertainers, concert halls, promoters and yes, the public.

As a result, most of Tennessee’s live entertainment venues, including the Orpheum and FedExForum, have lined up behind legislation this year called the Fairness in Ticketing Act. If approved by the legislature, the bill offers some common-sense help to consumers who are looking to buy tickets from secondary sources online.

The remedies include a requirement that online ticket sellers disclose the original face value of a ticket before it is marked up for resale; an acknowledgment that the ticket seller actually possesses the ticket he is trying to sell, and a statement on secondary ticket websites that makes it clear the site isn’t the official box office for the performance venue.

These are needed steps to take the worry out of buying tickets online. And perhaps most important, the Fairness in Ticketing Act would ban the use of computer software robots, or “bots,” to buy bulk tickets to a show when the tickets first go on sale.

Many of the bot-driven scalpers are trying to fog up the issue by claiming that the artists and venues are attempting to pinch off scalpers and protect Ticketmaster as the king of all ticket sales.

Not true. The Fairness in Ticketing Act doesn’t ban individuals from scalping tickets. If you have a ticket that you can’t use, or even if you’ve bought a few tickets to scalp in front of FedExForum, this bill doesn’t affect you. And other sellers, besides Ticketmaster, will be allowed tickets.

The Fairness in Ticketing Act strives to remove deceptive, unfair practices from the buying and selling of tickets to big events.

But there is another, equally important step: vigilance on the part of consumers.

Know what you are buying. Go to trusted sources. Take steps to reduce the chances you are being duped.